To write an essay on "A world without science" you need to agree what "science" is

A world without science.

"A world
without science." The most obvious thing to do would be talk about
how terrible it would be not to have electric lighting or computers.
Or even explain how much of a difference medicine makes, and how glad
I am I have access to antibiotics and aspirin. But I think there are
other questions I need to ask first. Just to make sure I'm
answering the right question, I'd like to make sure we agree on the
meaning of all the words in the question

Since my
essay title is "A world without science", I'd like to start
with "science". What do you think science is? Is it the same as
what people in the middle ages thought science was? Almost certainly
not. Or your own grandparents? There are some things that I'm sure
we all agree are science; for example combustion engines or
electricity, but others are less clear. If electricity is science,
then is fire? People have almost always used small amounts of
technology. Even 'cave men' made flint knives and used friction
to create sparks and light fires. The word atom is ancient Greek; the
concept of an atom was thought up by an ancient Greek philosopher.

If all of
these things are science, then I don't think I can imagine a world
without science. Certainly not one with humans in it. And if we argue
that some of these things aren't science, then maybe in the future
some of what we say is science will no longer be counted as such, and
so we are already living in a world without science.

Then
again, even once you have an agreed definition for "science" you
need to agree what "without science" means. Gravity wouldn't
disappear if we knew less about it. It depends on how you see
concepts. Do they exist separately from our knowledge of them? Does
someone bring a concept into existence, or discover something that
was always there? Newton's laws were true before he thought of
them, but a concept has no solid from, no more than any thought. So
until it's been thought there's nothing there.

I've
almost managed to work out what the question is asking for. I may
still be wrong, but I think that by "science" we probably mean
either technology or human understanding of scientific concepts. Now,
if it's concepts then I start asking, what is a scientific concept?
People have always know things fall when you drop them. Is that
science? Or did it suddenly become science when Newton wrote a set of
formulae? As for technology, the wheel is definitely technology. And
even before that, a spindle, or a knife, or thousands of other basic
tools people have used for millennia.

We've
now discussed the meaning of both "science" and "without
science". It might also be interesting to discuss the meaning of "a
world" as opposed to "the world", or even "a culture", but
that would need another essay.

All in
all, I don't think that people will ever live in a world completely
without science, though they may use less than us. I still don't
know if this is the answer you wanted or expected, but it's my
genuine thoughts.

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